Growth in California is slowing, but the tech boom and the sturdy job market in Silicon Valley and the Bay Area should help the state ward off a recession until at least 2018, economic forecasters predicted on Wednesday.

For now, however, a slowdown in the United States economy has begun to affect the economy in California, causing activity to slow in the Golden State, according to the closely watched UCLA Anderson Forecast.

“At least through the end of 2018, we are not forecasting a recession” in California or the U.S., said Jerry Nickelsburg, a senior economist with the Anderson Forecast.

The Anderson economists are confident about this projection despite the staying power of the current economic upturn.

“The expansion has been going on for a number of years, but expansions do not have calendar lives,” Nickelsburg said. “Expansions end when you have imbalances.”

At present, the supply of labor, products and services doesn’t appear to have outstripped the demand for those. This means that the kinds of severe imbalances that tend to cause recessions have yet to sprout.

“The sectors that have been creating the most jobs seem to have good fundamentals, and that includes the tech sector,” Nickelsburg said.

Still, the forecast projected that the pace of job growth in California will slow significantly this year. Even worse, by next year, the rate of employment expansion will slow to only half the pace of last year.

“Of course, job growth is going to slow down,” said Stephen Levy, director of the Palo Alto-based Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy. “The rest of the world economy is pretty fragile. Interest rates may be rising further. You have demographic changes such as the retirement of more baby boomers.”

California jobs grew by 3 percent in 2015, but the Anderson Forecast predicts that will slow to 2.4 percent growth in 2016. Total jobs are expected to grow by only 1.5 percent in California during 2017 and by a scant 0.8 percent in 2018.

The unemployment rate in California is expected to improve over the next two years and should fall to an average of 5 percent in 2017, before rising to 5.1 percent during 2018. As of February, the statewide jobless rate was 5.5 percent. In February 2015, the statewide jobless rate was 6.7 percent.

Personal income in California also is expected to show a marked slowdown.

Adjusted for inflation, personal income rose 4.5 percent during 2015 in California, and is expected to increase 3.6 percent during 2016. But in 2017, personal income statewide should rise 3.2 percent and in 2018, 3 percent, the Anderson Forecast predicted.

Retail sales, while expected to increase over the next few years, also are predicted to soften.

In contrast, inflation in California is expected to worsen. Consumer prices, the metric that economists use to quantify inflation, rose 1.5 percent statewide during 2015, but are expected to rise by an annual pace of 2.3 percent in 2016. In 2017, consumer prices in California are expected to jump 3.5 percent.

For better or worse, the fate of the economy in the Bay Area, and potentially California, could be tied to the fate of major technology companies rather than so-called “unicorns,” high-flying startups with valuations of $1 billion or more.